Author's Note: Sorry for the long wait. I had a lot of trouble with another one of my stories and needed to get through some of it before coming back to this one.

Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on how you look at it, this story still has quite a ways to go. But that also means the updates may lag a bit. Have patience, please, and remember to sit back, relax . . . and enjoy the ride.

I found some new, well relatively speaking, music to listen to during the beginning of writing this chapter. It's called 'Falling Slowly' sung by Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova. It's easily found on Youtube, just type in the title of the song. I would put up a URL but apparently those things don't show up all that well sometimes. Trust me, it fits them both, especially Sasuke.

Chapter 17

Play Me Love

Naruto could feel the sheets brush up against his legs. Fingertips trailed up his hip and around his shoulder slowly. He sighed softly and shifted to feel Sasuke's breath on his face. It smelled of sweet tangerine, or maybe pomegranate. Naruto wasn't too sure. He'd never been very good with health food. Strange, he always said he couldn't stand sweet things. Naruto smiled softly, feeling it grow a bit as Sasuke's hand slid along his cheek. His fingers splayed over the marks there. Perhaps Naruto should have asked Kakashi what had really caused them. No one had ever really given him an answer and he had felt odd asking after a while. Sasuke's face came into focus gradually and Naruto blinked the rest of the sleep from his eyes. A soft quality Naruto saw as tenderness seemed to emanate from him. He smiled wider.

"Hey," he said quietly.

"Hey," Sasuke responded just as delicately. Sasuke's eyes traveled over his face and his fingers came up to trail through his hair. Naruto leaned up as much as he was able, Sasuke only a mere few inches above him, and kissed him on the mouth, one hand cupping his cheek.

"Hey," he said again.

"You said that already," Sasuke remarked calmly.

He leaned down and kissed Naruto, brushing his lips around to his jaw-line. When they parted again, Naruto could hear his own heart in his ears. Or maybe he had accidentally pulled in natural energy and it allowed for Sasuke's heart to at last find a voice. Sasuke shifted and turned them until Naruto was splayed out on his back. His hands drifted along his exposed skin wherever he found it. Naruto couldn't stop him even if he wanted too. The sensation was too perfect. He moaned low in his throat and struggled to grasp at anything he could reach, just as Sasuke seemed to be doing. The clothes they wore fell away, sighing softly as they left the bed. It was as if everything around them could see what was happening, how precious it was, and moved out of the way. The kissing continued, Sasuke delving lower to Naruto's collar bone and then his chest. Naruto nipped without teeth at Sasuke's forehead. It was the only part he could grab hold of at the moment. They changed position again. Sasuke maneuvered his body, sliding all that skin over Naruto, until he perched between Naruto's knees. Naruto spread them out further but Sasuke wouldn't lean his full weight down. Instead, he searched his face mutely. Naruto smiled and pulled Sasuke's face down to meet his, kissing at his lips languidly.

He rested his head back down on the bed, taking Sasuke with him. Music, Sasuke thought. I can hear music. He traced his fingers back down Naruto's hip and around to his hardened cock. Rolling it in between his palm and fingers he heard a gasp and an almost inaudible moan. Naruto felt it when he brushed even lower and tensed slightly. Sasuke removed his hands to go back to kissing him with his eyes closed. When he moved his fingers down and once more rubbed at the cleft, Naruto relaxed into it. A finger slid inside him and he hardly felt anything. He concentrated only on Sasuke's face, his gentle fingers whispering down his spine, as he curled up to take in more of them. It was slow, so slow. Moments passed as hours, the day ended and began again for him. Sasuke pushed at Naruto's thighs to widen them further still. Then Naruto felt Sasuke's cock, hot and sweating faintly, press against him. Again, it was slow, nearly torturous, but Naruto could bear it. When they had finally bridged the space between them and all Naruto could see of their bodies mixed together, the music swelled inside his own head. A humming and a scorching heat spread along his stomach. It enveloped him fully when Sasuke began to move out a tiny bit and slowly pushed back in. Sasuke patiently bit the inside of his mouth and worked through the blinding pleasure until he felt the muscles surrounding him ease up. The pace quickened, and both their breaths came in heavy pants. Moaning loudly in Naruto's ear, he leaned down to kiss along it, something he had never tried before. Naruto jerked his head to the side a little and gasped.

"What? Is it too much?" Sasuke asked breathlessly. "Naruto?" he asked again when the other boy remained silent.

He tried to stop moving but Naruto held a hand against his back and dug into his buttocks sharply with his fingers.

"That . . . what you just did, it felt . . . so good," Naruto murmured. Sasuke frowned a little before licking the rim of Naruto's ear and pushing back in, a smile dancing just below the surface. Naruto caught it when Sasuke pushed up onto his elbows and he could see his face. The rhythm of thrusting and grunting and moaning drifted out of sync a bit but it was still beyond what they'd had before. And, it was so much better. The heat pooling in his stomach clenched and Naruto cried out against Sasuke's chest. Liquid spread upward from his cock as Sasuke pushed in a few more times, though not at all roughly. He moaned suddenly, loud and long. Sweating and breathing heavily, he collapsed onto the bed half-leaning on his partner. His vision had gone hazy. He fought to see clearer as Naruto turned to him. The smile, so content, and more than a little sleepy, was enough to bring him out of it fully.

"Are you alright?" Sasuke could still feel his heart pounding madly in his chest. Naruto hummed in response and snuggled up to his shoulder.

"I'm fine. That was unbelievable, Sasuke. I had no idea it could . . . well, you get it, right?"

Sasuke smiled warmly, the glow reaching his eyes for the first time since Naruto had known him.

"Yeah, I know. I get it."

Naruto nibbled at his lips a few times before they relaxed around the tangled sheets together.

"I get it, Naruto."

"Good, now go take a shower. I'm too tired to move right now and you smell awful," Naruto shot back.

"What?!" Sasuke cried indignantly. "I do not! If anyone does, it's you, you slob!"

"Whatever. I'll remember that the next time you want morning sex," Naruto reminded him.

Sasuke had a heavy retort ready but then he saw the narrowed eyes and devilish grin Naruto sent him and huffed. He got up, feeling a touch stiff, and made his way to the bathroom taking care not to let on how weak his muscles had gotten. It was all Naruto's fault anyway, waking up with that sleepy, sexy look on his face, Sasuke thought. Damn it.

Naruto thought about what he'd noticed in Sasuke while the other boy showered. Thinking on it made him question his own torturous, and yet captivating, journey with him. His feelings for Sasuke weren't the same as when they'd been together as part of Kakashi's team. They weren't the same as when Naruto had chased him across whole countries either. They felt close to what he'd had deep in the pit of his stomach whenever Sakura had been around.

He realized he had yet to visit her grave, just as he hadn't made the time to search out any of his other friends. The question of how deep his feelings went for Sasuke rose up again inside him. It was clear and yet so confusing. Is that really what it was? Could there really be so many ways to love? He knew one thing with a certainty that ripped through all his bewildering thoughts and left the shreds to collect on the floor beneath his feet as he sat up.

He could not let it pass by unheard. He'd made that mistake with Sakura. And now he couldn't be sure if she had truly heard, or felt any better, for knowing how he'd truly felt. She had died alone and the ache in his heart was still present whenever the thought had time to settle. The sound of the curtain drawing back in the shower drew his attention and Naruto steadied himself. Sasuke walked out, a towel draped around his hips and drops of water decorating his pale skin. Naruto fought the almost instantaneous desire welling in his chest. Swallowing helped. Closing his eyes and breathing deeply helped more.

"What was that you were saying about not wanting to get up? You can stay there a little longer while I grab something from the store for dinner. But the sheets really need to come off soon."

He was rummaging through the long dresser against the far wall, and then inside the Tallboy chest, for clothes.

"Sasuke," Naruto tried to catch his attention. He wanted this to be done right. Was this the right way? He didn't know who to ask. When their eyes met as Sasuke turned to him, eyebrow raised, Naruto found himself oddly disconnected, as if he was watching them both outside his own body.

"I love you." It had come out easily and his voice had sounded quite calm, to his ears anyway. No bells went off. There was no dramatic swell in an air filled with powerful emotions and longing. And still it didn't feel wrong exactly. Sasuke was silent a moment before he turned his head away and his eyes slid to the wall. When he began striding back toward the bathroom, Naruto was confused. He knew that Sasuke might not have been ready to hear it, but ignoring it wasn't going to do any good either. Or maybe Naruto had been wrong about him?

"Did you hear what I just said?" he asked.

Sasuke stopped moving just enough to throw a glance Naruto could barely make out over his shoulder.

"I heard you. And we still need to eat. We'll talk about this later," he replied.

The peel of the doorbell startled Naruto. He'd forgotten they even had one. No one had ever come calling before. But their living situation, even the fact that they had returned, might not have reached everyone that they knew.

"Could you get that, Naruto? I'm a little busy at the moment, and sort of half-naked."

Naruto balked at the request. He was completely naked. Or had Sasuke forgotten their most recent bout of lovemaking?! Now he was really pushing the bounds of Naruto's newly acquired love for him, the asshole. Grumbling, Naruto slid into some boxers and a pair of dark jeans he had found on the floor. Their home already looked lived in, as far as he could see. His clothes had all managed to find their way onto the floor, just where he liked them. The jeans themselves, when worn and not wrinkling on the hard wood, hung low on his hips and fit them snugly while sagging out and down the rest of his legs to stop just above the floor. They were, by far, the most comfortable things he owned, aside from his work-out and mission attire. He held no qualms about anyone seeing them, though he opted not to add a shirt.

He continued to grumble and bemoan Sasuke's attitude all the way down the stairs, breath hitching a little at the soreness in his backside. Damn him, he was being belligerent and he had caused that part of him to ache again. It hadn't hurt while he'd been lying down. To think he had confessed, and as simply as he could. But Sasuke managed to complicate it, Naruto thought darkly as he headed for the front entrance to quiet the incessant ringing.

The moment the door swung open, he wanted to shut it again . . . and quickly. Ino, Shikamaru and Chouji stood on the threshold and Naruto felt himself staring numbly at them. Especially at Ino; she had been so close to Sakura once. But, he was able to form a grand smile, even if he didn't feel all of it and pulled the door open wider to let them.

"Hey, you! I was just thinking about coming to find some of you guys! How have you been, Shikamaru, Chouji . . . Ino?"

Shikamaru smiled and laughed, Chouji gave him a gentle pat on his shoulder and Ino . . . Ino seemed out of place and it made her look sheepish and embarrassed to him. He'd never really talked with any of them aside from the Chunin exams or a mission. He didn't know what to say now. Luckily, Shikamaru, always so smart, started off for them all.

"You've been away too long. But that's no excuse to not see your friends, Naruto. So we thought we'd drop the hint, in case that part of you hasn't changed."

He smiled as he spoke and just like that it was easier for Naruto.

"You have no idea what's been happening, do you? But that's okay. It's not a story most people could live with."

"But you're not most people, eh Naruto?" Chouji injected himself into the conversation effortlessly. Naruto laughed, not because any of the things that had driven him away were funny but because he felt the calm nature and good will of his friends. He turned to Ino but before he could say anything, Sasuke came down the steps still towel-drying his hair. At least he'd put on some clothes.

"Ah, Sasuke, look! We have visitors!" he called happily.

"I can see that," Sasuke replied calmly. His eyes canted between them all slowly and he started for the door. "I have to go. Dinner, remember?" he reminded Naruto.

Naruto frowned and hurried to catch up. He pulled Sasuke aside just as he finished putting on his shoes.

"Hey, just because they don't know you aside from what you did or didn't do before, doesn't mean they don't want to."

Sasuke huffed a little and paused.

He finally turned to meet the glare Naruto was giving him.

"And, if I don't want to know them?"

Naruto waited until Sasuke stared straight into his eyes before replying, "You don't have to go now. They've come by to see how we're doing, after all."

Sasuke caught the small smile Shikamaru threw his way from the great room. He hummed lightly, feeling uncomfortable with all the attention.

Naruto leaned into his shoulder, his lips brushing his ear, and he recognized it as a ploy to get him to listen. Of course, the added affect of all conscious thought being slammed outside of his head in favor of the heat starting up below his belt probably went unnoticed. At least he hoped it did.

"If you don't know them, you can't judge them yet," he whispered urgently.

Sasuke could still feel the ringing in his ears as he walked away, deciding on a light stroll before going to pick up some meat and vegetables. Maybe he'd manage to waste enough time for the whole thing to blow over because Naruto's friends would have no choice but to leave, eventually. He kicked angrily at the ground and hesitated only a moment before going to find the one person he knew he'd find nothing more to share with than a companionable silence.

Naruto sighed a little, drawing his fingers threw his hair and pulling at the ends. He turned back to smile at the trio of people standing around his living room.

"Who wants something to drink?" he asked cheerily.

Chouji raised a hand hesitantly and Naruto chuckled as he moved off to get it. He caught Ino out of the corner of his eye staring about the room, looking a little dazed. But then he saw that Shikamaru, and even Chouji, were just as stunned. He shook his head, not understanding what was so special. Returning with a few glasses of iced tea that Sasuke had made while Naruto had slept, he joined them all. They sat down on the brand new furniture and Naruto relaxed back into the comfortable, cool leather of the cushions.

"This is all brand new stuff, huh?" Shikamaru commented, waving a hand airily around.

"Yup, we just got the rest delivered the other day, not too long after my latest hospital stay," Naruto said, then regretted it as he saw all their faces fall a little. But Chouji, unexpectedly, was the one to save it.

"You know, Naruto, there's been a lot going on recently. I'm sure you've heard about it all by now. A little late, if you ask me, but there's nothing you need to worry about anymore, at least not alone. We came by to tell you that. And to sneak a look at how bad the house had diminished since you and that . . . Uchiha, moved in," he quipped.

Naruto rumbled laughter at him and the smile Shikamaru was trying to hide as he glared at Chouji.

"Sasuke's not like that now. You'd know that if he'd bothered to stay, the ass," he snorted between the giggling.

Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, we figured, what with him being reinstated already and all. But he'll come around, soon enough if you're sticking with this village."

What Shikamaru said should have been sobering all on its own let alone the implications he'd left underfoot. Naruto ignored it all in favor of trying to placate Ino. She seemed to be suffering with something, something she wanted to say. Naruto had a good idea what it was about.

"Ino," he said quietly, "Maybe you could, uh, tell me about her. What you knew. But . . . when we have more time, ya know? I still haven't visited her yet, so it may take a while to . . ." he smiled an apology and Ino brightened up a little. The room itself had been waiting for it, to Naruto's way of thinking.

"Okay, Naruto. Don't worry about it," she told him softly. "Anyway, it's not like I've got a lot of juicy stories for you. But I do know a few good ones. I'd be happy to talk to you . . . later." Her banter had gotten stronger as she talked. The house, and everyone in it, glowed a little brighter for it.

"Good," Naruto nodded, satisfied. "Now, who wants to tell me about their latest mission?" He wiggled his eyebrows a bit and they all laughed. Shikamaru silently thanked Sasuke. Whatever he had done, whatever he was doing, worked beautifully.

Sasuke found a tree near the Academy and leapt into it. He'd felt Kakashi's chakra nearby and knew he'd be along eventually. If it was only moments before he had to leave, he'd feel all the better for it. Sure enough, the older man alighted on the tree in front of him after only a short wait. Trust him to finally be on time for once when Sasuke had no use for it. He sighed and shifted restlessly.

"What?" he asked, just for something to do; that was all it was.

"You tell me, Sasuke. What are you doing out here instead of having dinner with Naruto?" Kakashi gave him a look and Sasuke wondered edgily about how much he had seen of their training session. He shook his head and lowered his eyes.

"I can't go back yet. Not until they leave," Sasuke murmured.

"Who?" Kakashi asked curiously.

"Naruto's friends," Sasuke mumbled. He wasn't entirely sure he should be confiding in Kakashi given that he probably thought it meant Sasuke had forgiven him. He hadn't, yet. But there was no one else.

"Ah," Kakashi replied helpfully.

Sasuke huffed. He jumped a bit at Kakashi's hand on his shoulder and realized the Jounin had settled in beside him.

"Well, we can sit here, for a while. By the time it gets dark, they should be gone."

Sasuke said nothing. Instead, he leaned back against the tree and drew a leg up to watch the sunset with him.

"I could tell you a story, if you like, while we wait. I could tell you what I know about your family." Kakashi cast his eyes to the side to gauge Sasuke's reaction. Sasuke didn't say anything. He did lean his head a little to the side. Kakashi took it as a sign to continue.

"Your father was a hard man to know. Your mother was beautiful and complimented him in that she was easy to get along with, and she knew him well. Your brother . . . your brother was strong and smart. Fugaku had high hopes for him, and high expectations. He pushed Itachi to rise beyond any of the other clan members. Perhaps that was what drew Itachi to befriend Madara, I don't know. There were rumors that he had been seen in the village again. His power wasn't just the Mangenkyo, Sasuke. He had a lot of charisma, a lot of anger, and he pulled as many of your clan into it as he could. But Fugaku, he learned of the treachery they were planning and put a stop to it. That angered Madara, enough to enlist Itachi in his effort to punish them. Afterwards," he paused for a moment to let everything sink in.

"Afterwards, no one really is sure what happened. Your father's journal, which the council ordered be kept from you to try and save you from diving into the same hate and darkness, only spoke of his fears for his son. He knew that Itachi had gotten too close to power, too used to it. He wanted more. He had become obsessed with activating the higher forms of the Sharingan. So much so that he was willing to go against every moral code and sell himself to Madara's dream of pain and vengeance. If your own father hadn't even seen how far Itachi had fallen, how could anyone else have known about it?"

Kakashi stopped and waited. He felt torn between wanting to make Sasuke understand as best he could about that time, and wanting to protect him from all the possibilities. He'd suffered more than enough from the massacre. But if Sasuke could understand that it wasn't the council, that hindsight was only useful to a point, and that anyone who knew what was happening had made only the choices they thought would best rectify everything, then Kakashi could sleep easier. Maybe he was just being selfish but there was no point in hiding anything anymore. He had seen what that had done to ruin him. He opened his mouth to speak again when Sasuke turned his head to face him.

"That's enough, Kakashi. I've heard enough. I'm not so angry anymore. Well, not enough to kill them all. Thinking back on it, I'm sure I probably saw more than I thought at the time. I couldn't have done more. Or at least that's what I kept telling myself. The council could have done more, or the Hokage should have seen it. But that was so long ago. I guess . . . I guess I just wanted to hear that I wasn't to blame. That all I ever did was enough. I should have seen it, maybe. But putting it all on the shoulders of a few, when there were so many others, and they obviously all couldn't have been joined against my family. Too many of them only saw what they wanted to see, the villagers expecting a grand continuation of a powerful clan. The council probably hoped for the same. It wouldn't make sense for them to fear what they thought they had control over. Right?"

Kakashi thought about that for a moment before replying.

"Like I said, hindsight is a nearly useless thing. Except for future concerns, it doesn't give us much, except perhaps, closure, a reason behind it all. But, I think the council would have signed their own death warrants and deaths by torture at that, if they had known what was truly happening and done nothing. They are too old to have gone that road for such stupid things as jealousy, envy or fear of power. Who really knows? I do know that they are loyal to the health of this village. And that the current Hokage is compassionate and strong. She can keep them in line and would have recognized any dissent or malevolence within them. And I trust her judgment. It's enough for me, it has to be. I'm not going to assume danger unless I can find evidence of it."

"And Naruto?" Sasuke asked accusingly, glaring heatedly at him. "What about him?"

"What about him, Sasuke?" Kakashi countered. "He's strong, healthy, and has a long life ahead of him. He will be a great ninja. For that, you need the council, because their decisions directly affect the village and its citizens, ninja included. The ANBU are working tirelessly to fix what Danzou likely started with the rumors and whispers of imminent danger connected only to Naruto. Worse, he seems to have given away information that the council had known about this supposed enemy for a while but chose to do nothing because Naruto is a valuable commodity, being the last Jinchuuriki and all."

Sasuke snorted and pulled his face into a look of disgust.

"So, it's just going to happen again, is what you're saying, right?"

"No, I'm saying that, as ninja, we are trained to look beyond what we can see with our eyes," Kakashi replied, unruffled. He gave Sasuke a look that told him he should know this already. And Sasuke did. He smiled then, because he understood what Kakashi had meant by all this. He understood perfectly.

"We'll find him, then, whoever it is Danzou has been feeding information to," he said quietly, threat lacing his words.

Kakashi beamed under his mask, his eyes closing and arcing upward.

"Wonderful! I knew you were smart enough . . . and mature enough, to get it now."

Sasuke huffed and looked away, crossing his arms over his chest. They sat like that, comfortable in each other's presence to not need words anymore, until the sky changed colors. Brilliant hues of orange and red, light pink dusting the horizon, met their gaze to the west. When the night had taken hold over the village fully, Sasuke stood up to brush off his pants and slide easily down the bark to the ground. As he started off, Kakashi called him back.

"You know, Sasuke. They don't have to be just Naruto's friends. They can be yours, too."

Sasuke stopped moving. He'd thought about that happening but had dismissed it out of hand long ago. Too much time had passed and he'd done too many things to rely on any trust remaining in any of them to have been saved for him. Naruto's words plowed through his niggling doubt as they always seemed to do.

'You don't have to go now. They've come by to see how we're doing, after all.'

And Shikamaru had given him that thin smile. It might have held no invitation but there was no malice either. Sasuke didn't know enough about him to see it as anything else. And that was the point, wasn't it? That was what Naruto had meant with that comment.

'If you don't know them, you can't judge them yet.' Sasuke sighed and lifted a hand to Kakashi in farewell. He could judge them as he pleased. He could do anything he damn well liked. But that would gain him nothing he could use to build a life here, or re-build the old one, as the case may be. And it would not make Naruto happy. Why did things always have to be so complicated? Why did simple-minded Naruto always make them that way? Because he loves me? Sasuke heard the small voice in his head and pushed it away violently. Gods, that was so sentimental and not what he needed right now . . . or even what he wanted. He didn't want that. But maybe that was just how it was supposed to be, simple yet complicated.

Sasuke turned the key in the lock and pushed the door open. The soft glow from the great room lamps welcomed him in and he relished in the heat of their home a moment before taking off his shoes. Their home, those two words were so simple, so small, and yet he felt a soothing balm spread through him whenever he thought about it. He hadn't thought, in all the years he had spent training to gain strength, in all the fights that only served to bring him closer to killing Itachi and certainly not when he'd finally attained that goal, he would ever be able to feel that way again. He had always told himself it didn't matter. Nothing mattered but his vengeance, his family's honor, and later, his own pain. Truthfully, though it hurt to admit it even to himself, he had felt almost empty at first when he'd killed his brother. But slowly, that space was filling in, with what he wasn't so sure just yet. But he no longer had trouble sleeping, kept awake at night by his family's deaths or Itachi's final gifts to him. He'd been a good brother once, a good friend and he had struggled against the pull of Madara and his own guilt for so long. But he was dead and there was no changing any of it. Sasuke sighed and hefted the bag of groceries over his shoulder.

"Naruto, I'm back," he called out. I'm home.

When he heard nothing aside from the ticking of the clock on the wall, he walked toward the stairs, leaving the meat and vegetables on the hall table. They would keep for a few more minutes. He found Naruto settled on the bed in their room, an open book splayed out on his lap. Sasuke arched a brow delicately. But he caught the title as it slid toward the floor and realized it was one of Naruto's old sensei's novels. He nearly gagged in disgust. There was nothing enlightening or instructive about reading that kind of crap. He was tempted to throw it into the stove while he made dinner but stopped when he realized there was a handwritten message on the inside of the cover. He read through it quickly, waiting for one of Naruto's surprise wake-up calls. He would have sensed the difference in his breathing definitely, but a person could never be too cautious.

'To Naruto,

My favorite, moron of a student. Sometimes, to see the joy in things, you have to see what could be instead of what is. Here's a little something about what could happen, under the right light.'

Sasuke frowned at the message, not clear on what it was supposed to mean. Did that pervert actually equate pornographic sex with a lasting, and healthy lifestyle? He flipped the book over to read the synopsis and gasped. This one wasn't a love story, not even Jiraiya-sensei's loose estimation of one. It was about a ninja that mirrored Naruto, though it had been published before he'd been born. Naruto must have gotten it from him during their travels together. But the seal on the side said it had once been the property of the village library, a large, brick building on the west side of town, close to the Hokage Mountain. Sasuke frowned deepened, but he decided it was probably a sensitive issue to ask right after waking up so he let it go until later.

"Naruto," he called, running his fingers through that shining hair gently. Naruto mumbled a little and shifted a bit before settling back into the bed.

"Naruto, wake up. I'm home."

Naruto opened his eyes and yawned a little before rubbing at them.

"Sasuke? Oh, hey, you're back," he said thickly.

"Yeah."

"They left already," he told Sasuke, getting up and stretching languidly.

Sasuke rolled his eyes a little. "Well, I got that, seeing as how the house is devoid of any inhabitants but us."

"Huh?" Naruto asked and Sasuke wasn't sure if he was seriously unaware of what that had meant or he was still half asleep.

"Forget it. Next time, maybe," Sasuke grumbled, avoiding his gaze. Naruto blinked the rest of the sleep from his eyes and caught on, finally, to what he'd just said. He smiled widely and allowed his eyes to drift halfway closed. Then his stomach grumbled loudly and he looked up expectantly.

"No, I didn't forget. Come on, I'll make us some steaks and rice. But, you're doing the dishes," he called over his shoulder as he made his way to the stairs. Naruto rushed after him, whooping happily.

"No sweat. I don't mind dish duty if I don't have to cook."

"Don't know how, more like it," Sasuke shot back, amused.

"Hey! I can too!" Naruto squawked indignantly.

"I keep telling you ramen doesn't count for anything, at all," Sasuke replied smugly. He pulled Naruto around the bottom part of the banister for a quick, open-mouthed kiss that served its purpose. There would be silence throughout the rest of the meal, from conception to the dish-work at the end because of it, Sasuke was sure. He smirked as Naruto followed him into the kitchen in a light daze. Yes, coming home had its advantages.